al Qaeda, War on Terror

Al-Qaeda training western looking terrorists in Pakistan

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The AFP reports:

CIA director Michael Hayden warned Sunday that Al-Qaeda was training operatives who “look western” and could enter the United States undetected to conduct terrorist attacks.
…
“They are bringing operatives into that region for training — operatives that, a phrase I would use, wouldn’t attract your attention if they were going through the customs line at Dulles (airport near Washington DC) with you,” Hayden told NBC television.

The new recruits “look western” and “would be able to come into this country … without attracting the kind of attention that others might,” he said.

Perhaps the strangest assertion that I have ever heard is those who say “the Bush administration is only trying to scare people” whenever a report similar to this comes out. Most of them also screamed that the administration did not do enough to prevent 9/11. The not funny thing is none of them seem to be demanding that House Speaker Pelosi bring the Senate’s version of the update to the FISA law to the floor for a vote.

9/11, FISA, Terrorist Surveillance Program

Not just one missed terrorist’s call, Attorney General Mukasey

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“We knew that there had been a call from someplace that was known to be a safe house in Afghanistan and we knew that it came to the United States. We didn’t know precisely where it went. We’ve got 3,000 people who went to work that day, and didn’t come home, to show for that.” — Attorney General Michael Mukasey, speaking last week “in Nancy Pelosi’s hometown.”

AG Michael Mukasey revealed new, stunning information: he now knows precisely to whom that call was made. As 13 of the 15 muscle hijackers came late and knew little, that call undoubtedly was to one of only seven men: Zacarias Moussaoui; the two members of al-Qaeda muscle hijackers who the CIA knew, in March 2000, had entered the United States two months prior, Khalid al Mihdhar and Nawaf al Hazmi; or one of the four hijacker pilots, Hani Hanjour, Marwan al Shehhi, Ziad Jarrah, and Mohamed Atta. All seven trained to fly after they arrived here. As they entered America alone or in pairs and initially moved and operated independently, each separately made updates to Khalid Sheikh Mohammed via a common communications network. In addition, with Moussaoui excluded, literally hundreds of communications took place between the remaining six.

Yesterday, the Wall Street Journal quoted Mukasey citing ‘One Missed Call‘ — had only we been listening. Yet the 9/11 Commission found that “communications sufficient to enable planning and direction of the operatives and those who would be helping them” was a critical element in the successful attack. What follows are obvious examples of the terrorists’ communications, to illustrate the many ‘dots’ uncollected before 3,000 died. [Note that the first two citations are to demonstrate that our intelligence agencies knew Khalid al Mihdhar and Nawaf al Hazmi to be al-Qaeda and had arrived in the United States on January 15, 2000]: